Exploring the Gateway

The ground was rough and cold, it was definitely not what John would have picked to rest on, but it wasn’t like they had any other options. He kept shifting around on the ground, trying to find a comfortable position, but found none, the rest were much the same. A dreary and terrible atmosphere had fallen over the alcove, only aided by the terrible stench. That of blood, humidity, and moss.

John knew the situation was as severe as it could be, and that somehow made his anxiety both constant and in the back of his mind. An army of wolves were still close to them, lying in wait in front of the Mana wall John had created. The pack was waiting for its chance, and attacking once in a while to check their defenses. If John’s new skill popup was to be believed, that would not be long, and the Mana bar on the side of his interface confirmed that fear. It drained ever more quickly, and there was nothing he could to stop it.

He could barely even keep himself concentrated on the wall enough to refill it, with the wolves taking occasional chunks out of the blue layer of defense. That was mainly due to the wrenching feeling in his stomach. It was absurdly hot in the alcove, and the humidity and smell was even worse, with all their sweat and grime concentrated in one small area. John felt sick, and when he looked to the others they weren’t in much better shape. All their breathing was louder and faster, and they all still carried various injuries. Barely even having the energy to stay on their feet. Without much choice but sitting around and waiting, they had stuck to that so far, hoping to recover some of their energy.

“Does anyone have any ideas?” John asked, trying to break the silence and terrible atmosphere with some sort of helpful conversation. Unfortunately his question was only met with silence for a couple of minutes, only worsening the situation.

“Maybe there’s another way out?” Yan suggested, her tone muted and her breathing labored.

“T-that’s the first thing I searched for when I got stuck in here,” Charlotte said in return, quietly. Despite having been in the worst shape of all of them before, John noticed she was now the most lively. Though still, she looked paler than usual.

“So our only way out is through the wolves… Just perfect,” the sarcasm was obvious in Matthew's voice. His voice sounded certain, but solemn, almost like he already knew what was going to happen.

“Then we need to make a plan before we go kick their asses,” Bass sounded tired and far more serious than usual, but she was clearly the least stressed as well.

“I hope we can think of one then...” John’s frustration was mounting, and his mental state was currently the only thing separating them from a vicious mauling.

“Hey, we’ll all be fine. We just need to not panic, ok?” Bass said, her tone almost soft. She touched John’s shoulder lightly as she continued, “especially you, Boss, we don’t know how stable that Mana wall of yours is. You just learned it yesterday for fuck’s sake’s, so no losing focus!” she felt like a ray of light in the damp darkness of the cave.

“Bass is right. The longer we stay here the better shape we’re in, we all have recovered, at least somewhat… And it’s not like there are an infinite amount of them,” Yan agreed, her breathing had calmed somewhat.

“Let’s see if we can prepare for whenever they break it then,” John figured it was a good idea, and the rest nodded in approval. They set about their work almost immediately.

“There’s some mud near the entrance, I’ll see if I can move it to trip up the wolves as they enter,” the shapeshifter turned to the entrance.

“I’ll h-heal Yan and you John, since you guys are still in-injured,” Charlotte said, as briskly as she could manage, and then pressed her gloveless hands against John’s wounds. This time John could feel them, they were unnaturally cold, and as she healed him he felt a sense of wrongness replace his pain.

“My ice should be able to supply water for us, I’ll see if I can find a container of some sort. If not, well, Yennifer will require some help with trapping the entrance,” Matthew sounded serious.

“My vibrations should be able to scare them off, so I’ll guard the entrance,” Bass said shortly.

All of them had been moved to action by Bass, but that didn’t surprise John, ’she’s far more suited to leadership than I am… I wonder why Ingrid ever thought it was a good idea to bring me in,’ the Gamer shook his head. There was no use thinking of something like that, he was there, and he was just glad to have her by his side at least.

He had another goal he needed to focus on. Which was recovering as much Mana as possible while keeping Arcane Barrier active. John felt the Mana needed to repair it draining him every time the wolves attacked, and so far his regeneration outweighed it only by the slightest margin, as it only needed repair sporadically. The problem was, the cost to keep the barrier up was increasing as the number of wolves attacking it increased. It meant they didn’t have much time left, especially with them growing bolder and attacking more frequently. With that thought in mind, he looked over Arcane Barrier’s new skill sheet, hoping to find some way to squeeze as much Mana as he could out of his reserves.

’It’s incredible how much of a difference learning that technique from Ingrid made… This is what happens when I work with the system instead of against it, I suppose. Good that I tried it too, otherwise we’d all be dead by now,’ he chuckled almost silently and in a bitter fashion, the thought was awful on every level. Regretting it instantly, he slapped the back of his left arm in reprimand. It hurt, but not more than the rest of his body.

Charlotte gave him a steely stare, almost in reaction, and spoke up, “I-i’m done, but I’m not sure you’re c-completely healed,” a second later she moved her hands off John, and he felt the coldness go away. Along with that he noticed the slight but insistent headache was missing. It was almost like a small needle had stopped bumping against his skull.

“I’m fine,” he responded. John wasn’t really sure it was true, but he needed to help the rest, not sit there whining.

“A-alright,” she moved on to Yan next, beginning to heal her wounds.

He still hadn’t found a way to optimize Arcane Barrier, so John decided to go with building some offense instead. With John’s limited Mana supply, he decided to summon a few rounds of Arcane Bolts, hoping that would be enough to combat the wolves. Even though the rest would absolutely handle far more than him, the few bolts might still help.

’I might not be the best leader… But I can rely on them. They’re my team, after all,’ the thought was almost a happy one, if John wasn’t still scared for all their lives.

Bass looked over to him as she continued to stream sounds through the Barrier. It scared off a few wolves every time, but they were slowly getting used to it. Almost reading his mind, she spoke, her eyes locked onto his “we’ll all get through this together, alright? Us supporting each other is what makes us a team!”

“Yeah, you’re right…” John responded, looking over at the others.

While Charlotte had healed him, Yan had made somewhat solid walls out of the mud at the entrance. While they looked fragile, they were almost as tall as the wolves, and would at least slow them as they came in. At this point they also covered about half of the length leading into the cave. She was clearly working diligently, John just hoped it would be enough.

Matthew on the other hand, had been working on hollowing out a small stone to put water into, using his powers to freeze the moisture on and inside the rock to carve small chunks away. Every time he did it the difference in temperature made more dew form on the stone. Looking at the drops of water coming down from the process, John realized something.

’Shit... I’m thirsty. Guess even I’m not that immune to physical needs. There’s more than that, it’s that same drained feeling I had after the lesson. I wonder why exactly it’s happening. I barely even know how generating Mana works,’ John kept remembering how little he knew about all this, ‘that’s a good for later. But I have to focus. Lets see if some strategic use of Orb of Light can help scare of the wolves,’ he decided to assist Bass in guarding the entrance.

“Hey, came here to help you Bass,” he told her as he leaned against the wall next to her.

“Good, I appreciate all the help I can get, boss. You alright though? Never seen you this pale before,” she sounded genuinely concerned.

“Yeah, just feel tired somehow. Not sure how to describe it,” the Gamer said with as calm a tone as he could manage.

“I heard that you could generate Mana without expending energy, but looks like even you have your limits. You know, casting spells is like using a muscle, you use both your body and your mind,” she was far less upbeat than usual, “I’m sure it’ll be alright though, we’ll get out of here soon…” she turned to Matthew, her expression showing concern, “hurry up with that water York!” her tone was not of ridicule, unlike every other time John had heard her talk to the ice mage.

“You don’t need to worry about me,” John said, before being shot an almost angry glance by Bass and being forced to sit down behind the walls, leaning his back on one of them.

His Orb of Light still did enough from that location to scare off some wolves, so he cycled it regularly every minute or so. Coordinating with Bass every time. Otherwise, all he could do was look around, and over the next twenty minutes he watched the others. Yan completed the wall about ten minutes after he sat down. Despite him supposedly resting, John was somehow getting more tired by the second.

It didn’t take long before the wolves figured out that his orb was also a trick, and they resumed attacking the barrier. Chipping slowly but steadily at John’s Mana reserves.

About twenty minutes after Yan finished the wall, John was given water out of the half hollowed stone. That did help his tiredness, but the mood in the cave had not improved at all.

Charlotte had finished healing Yan moments afterwards, and she was the next to drink. Her situation was strangely still the best out of them, even though she had healed both John and Yan not long before.

’I need to find out what her deal is, and soon. I can’t rely on her as long as she keeps hiding something like this,’ he wasn’t sure what about her was bothering him now, but Charlotte was as much a mystery as ever. And this situation made him trust her even less, while their time and his Mana was running out.

“5 minutes left, at this rate,” he said, his breathing at this point was almost erratic. It was getting harder to concentrate, as John felt every attack on the Barrier chipping away at him. As if his very body was acting as the barrier.

“The rest of us are drinking and then we’re saving all our Mana to fight them when they come in. York, can you take the water out of the mud now that it’s built up?” Bass instructed the cryomancer. She continued, mumbling under her breath “that should make it at least a little more stable…”

Matthew moved to do exactly that, and the mud piled up at the entrance became brittle and hard in the blink of an eye. What water came out of it was gathered in small ice spikes on the top of the wall.

“The rest of us should rest then?” Yan turned to Bass as the ice mage acted.

“Yeah,” she had taken command of the situation, and John was extremely grateful.

Another wave of wolves rammed against the Barrier, clawing at it. The drain of Mana hit John like a brick wall, and he felt his focus slipping. Black filled his vision, and the barrier fell apart.

In the corner of his eye he saw the others rush into ready stances, they had noticed what had happened. All of them heard the noise of the wolves swarming into the cavern. Some died one the spikes of ice, but most made it past, running into the alcove over the corpses of their brothers.

Yan’s hands became claws again, and the first few wolves to reach her were torn apart. Streams of bright sound appeared all across John’s dwindling sight, throwing wolves to the floor and pushing them back. The sound of crunching bones and the howls of death were all John could hear, as he wavered in and out of consciousness.

The smell was even more horrible than before, metallic blood combined with the dampness of the cave in a way that made it feel like every inch of his body was covered with it… Seconds later, he felt a warm liquid on his hand, blood had sprayed over the wall from a wolf Matthew had killed.

Another wave of wolves got over the wall as quickly as they appeared, a ramp of corpses had been built to support them. Trying to protect him, Charlotte suddenly stood in front of John, between him and the action. He couldn’t see what she was doing, but he could see the bodies piling up under her. The room had become much colder and black light concentrated around her. Feeling a sense of wrongness for the second time that day, he blacked out.

He woke up sometime later, the cavern was clear of bodies apart from his friends. They all looked far worse and far better, with bruises and injuries all over them, but they also all had large smiles on their face and they looked energetic. Like a wave of adrenaline had hit them but not passed just yet. All of them were once again sitting in a circle, looking at John as he opened his eyes.

“You’re finally awake!” Bass shouted over to John.

“Yeah, I feel awful,” a headache was ringing through his brain, as if it was trying to escape his skull.

’Clearly I have my limits too… I really should ask Ingrid if I can avoid this in the future,’ the pain was slowly subsiding, but it was still preventing him from focusing on too much in particular. Yan quickly got up and brought him the hollowed out rock, which was once again full of water. She returned back to the others a bit after.

“Thank you Yan, my brain feels like it’s going to explode,” he said, drinking as much as he could before placing it down near him.

“You drained too much Mana,” Matthew stated coldly.

"Yeah… You really should be more careful John," said Bass, her smile was still huge, but she sounded worried.

"Why? What happens if I don't?" John said, regretting it immediately afterwards.

"Mana comes from the mind, and once the mind is stressed above its limits, it shuts down… After that, it comes from the soul," Yan responded to him, her voice solemn.

“And if you drain your soul, that damage is permanent,” Bass continued.